What to teach a preschooler
Teaching Preschool at Home | Raising Lifelong Learners
Do you have preschool-aged kids? Are you struggling with what to do for the upcoming school year? Maybe you plan to homeschool, but aren’t sure exactly where to start, and worry that your kids will miss out on something by not going to a normal preschool… Maybe your kids are gifted — and asynchronous — and you know that they just won’t fit in at the local preschool.
You’re scared, overwhelmed, nervous.
Relax. Teaching preschool at home can be easy, rewarding, and one of the greatest things you can do for your child.
The fact is, you’re probably teaching your kiddo the things he or she would learn in preschool already, especially if you have a gifted child dragging you from museum, to science experiment, and over to your tinkering space for a little engineering.
Preschool at home can easily be fit into what you have already been doing with your children. They need to know some simple things: life skills, routines, and basic academics. There are lots of ways to integrate those three things into your day. And, honestly, I like to approach things with my kids from a better late than early standpoint. By this I mean that, while I won’t hold my kids back (indeed, my gifted kids won’t allow themselves to be stopped), I also won’t push in the early years.
Play, exploration, and discovery are their most important lessons when they’re young. It’s our job to spark that lifetime love of learning and get them excited about it during the preschool years.
Life skills
Learning to get along with others, following through on promises, obeying rules… these are important things to put in place before any kind of academics happen. If your child is struggling with heart issues, sending him to preschool may make those worse.
Before anything else is attempted, work on those things. Help your child get along with others. He can put away the silverware to help you in the kitchen. If the baby is crying, send him in the room a minute or two before you go in, and have him play peek a boo to try to calm her down for you.
Simple chores, family rules, and sibling love is important, and these are the skills that will grow your preschooler into a loving, compassionate adult.
Routines
Teaching your preschooler that there is a time and a place for everything can be tiring. It’s so much easier sometimes to just let him sleep in or put on another video.
Instead, remember that you’re raising a learner and leader. Have a set time to get up and start the day. Eat breakfast together and do some morning chores. Have loosely structured play and learning times, and make sure you plan for rest {or nap} times as well.
Having a routine doesn’t necessarily mean punching a clock, but it does mean giving your child something to look forward to. If breakfast just finished, and you always read together on the couch after you clean up the dishes, your child will come to look forward to that time together.
Building those little rituals starts with routine. And those rituals build closeness.
Academics
There are skills that most children will learn before they finish preschool, and they’re easily taught with a few simple school supplies and books from your local library. Children – especially preschoolers – learn by doing.
Play IS their job and education at this age. It’s important not to rush kids past this stage. Imaginative play is crucial to developing problem-solving and critical thinking skills.
You may wonder, though, what academic skills your preschooler should know by the time she is ready to head into kindergarten. By that time, your child should be able to:
- name the letters of the alphabet.
- sit and listen to a book.
- retell events from a favorite story.
- draw and write shapes and letters.
- write his first name.
- label drawings.
- tell a story through drawing and/or writing.
- sort objects.
- make simple patterns.
- name shapes.
- identify numerals 1-10.
- count to 20.
- speak clearly and in complete sentences.
- take turns talking.
- listen to and follow instructions.
- identify emotions and feelings.
- engage in activities for 15 minutes or more.
- follow rules.
- play well with others.
- hold pencils, crayons, and scissors properly.
Are you already working with your child on a lot of those things? See… you have nothing to worry about! Enjoy your kiddo, and learn, play, and discover together — you won’t regret this time spent.
You can do this – and will enrich your family so much by teaching your preschooler at home.
What do you think? For those of you who may have been in this place before, how did you integrate your child’s preschool learning into your already busy day? Leave me a comment with your ideas about preschool at home — I’d love to chat with you.
Then, check out my Raising Preschoolers board on Pinterest:
16 Things Kids Learn in Preschool
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Ever wondered what your kids are really learning at preschool when it seems like they’re just playing all day? The good news is that if it seems like they’re “just playing” then the school is doing something right!
Learning during the first 6 years is about building skills through play.
This does not only apply to babies and toddlers. Preschoolers learn best through play, when using their whole body and engaging the senses.
You may be wondering what a preschool curriculum should include or what subjects are focused on. This is not really that important. There is no curriculum-in-a-box, but rather a set of abilities and skills a preschooler should develop.
Some preschools choose to use set themes around which to plan play activities; others let themes develop naturally (learning about caterpillars when a child finds one in the garden).
A good quality preschool will give your children a well-rounded education through a balance of free play and well-planned, adult-guided play.
So, what do kids learn in preschool? Here are 16 things.
1. Gross Motor SkillsPhysical development starts with developing gross motor skills – the large muscles of the body.
At preschool, your children will be moving nonstop. Movement is the most important skill to develop first in the early years as it is necessary for all other learning.
Children must develop skills such as strength, hand-eye coordination and agility.
They also need to develop two important senses – vestibular and proprioception – responsible for balance and body awareness.
Movement is important as it stimulates learning, improves concentration, gives the brain oxygen and works both sides of the brain. Good gross motor skills also lay the foundation for fine motor skills.
Some examples of gross motor activities:
- Throwing and catching balls
- Playing hopscotch
- Singing action songs
- Playing with bean bags
- Balancing on beams
- Climbing and hanging
- Skipping and hopping
- Running and chasing games
Fine motor coordination – the development of the small muscles – is a prerequisite to learning how to write and is necessary for performing everyday tasks.
In preschool, children spend a large portion of their day working on these skills.
Fine motor skills are developed through all kinds of art activities, such as:
- Drawing
- Painting
- Cutting
- Pasting
- Box construction with waste materials
They can also be developed with other fine motor activities such as:
- Pegboards
- Puzzles
- Threading and lacing
- Playing with pegs
- Playing with construction toys (Lego is great)
- Moulding playdough
Developing a pencil grip and learning to form letters starts with all these kinds of fine motor activities.
3. Early Mathematical ConceptsPreschool is where the foundations for mathematics begin. No child ever learns maths in the first grade. The type of maths they learn just becomes more formal.
In the preschool grades children learn:
- Rote counting (such as counting up to 20)
- One-to-one correspondence (reliably counting objects)
- Classifying
- Sorting
- Length
- Capacity
- Weight
- Area
- Temperature
- Time
- Space
- Shape
These concepts are learned while having pure fun – in the sandpit, while baking, playing with water, building with blocks and even while tidying up.
4. Problem SolvingProblem solving is an important life skill and one that must be developed early on. Learning this in preschool also helps children with mathematical problem solving during the formal grades.
Problem-solving skills are built during simple activities such as:
- Construction play
- Building puzzles
- Playing board games
- Resolving problems during social play
Preschool is a language-rich environment where children’s vocabulary expands dramatically.
They learn sentence construction, the use of grammar and tenses, the meaning of words, etc.
Language and vocabulary are learnt throughout the day while:
- Having circle time discussions.
- Singing rhymes and songs.
- Playing games.
- Playing alone and with friends.
- Learning about a theme.
- Playing with toys, equipment and other materials.
- Listening to stories.
Writing starts with developing important pre-writing skills through play and art activities.
These four skills are specific requirements for learning to write and will be the focus during preschool:
- Pencil grip
- Crossing the midline
- Learning about letters and their formation (through play, not formal writing)
- Learning to form patterns (for example drawing big waves or zig-zags which mimic the shapes found in letters)
Listening is one of the most important and often underdeveloped skills. This should be a focus area during preschool.
Children learn to listen by doing these kinds of activities:
- Listening to stories
- Playing games such as Broken Telephone or I Spy
- Following instructions
- Class discussions
- Music activities
Although your children are learning to listen at school, it is highly recommended to focus on these skills at home too. Children with good listening skills are much more successful and capable at school.
Here are some listening games you can play at home.
8. Musical SkillsMusic in preschool is about so much more than just developing musical skills.
Music develops children’s:
- Vocabulary
- Understanding of rhyme, syllables and sounds
- Auditory perception
- Concentration
- Fine motor skills (finger plays)
- Gross motor skills (action rhymes)
- Mathematical skills (counting rhymes)
- decision-making skills (games such as musical chairs)
Visual and auditory perception are the two main building blocks of learning to read.
Children develop their visual perception during preschool with the following types of activities:
- Activities that teach about shapes and colours
- Patterning activities
- Puzzles and tangrams
- Card games
- Memory games
Auditory perception is the brain’s ability to make sense of what the ears hear. It is vital for being able to learn sounds for reading.
These kinds of activities develop auditory perception:
- Reciting rhymes and poems
- Playing with instruments
- Playing sound games
- Playing word games
During preschool children develop all the necessary pre-reading skills to set them up for learning to read formally.
Learning to read requires developing sound knowledge (auditory perception) and symbol knowledge (visual perception), as explained above.
These are the five main pre-reading skills:
- Print awareness – understanding that written words convey meaning.
- Motivation to read – exposure to books that ignites a desire to read.
- Listening comprehension – the ability to understand what is heard.
- Letter knowledge – informal exposure to letters and their sounds during play.
- Phonological awareness – being able to hear sounds in words (beginning, middle and end sounds).
Children are exposed to these kinds of activities:
- Playing rhyming games
- Playing word games
- Games involving hearing syllables
- Playing listening games
- Following instructions (single and multiple instructions)
At school, children also strengthen their memory, a skill they will rely on for learning throughout their education.
These are the kinds of games that are often played in preschool classes:
- Memory card games (get your own cards by downloading the FREE set of printables at the end of the post).
- Circle memory games such as “I went to the shops and I bought a…”. Each child has a turn to add an item, but must first recall the entire list before adding their item.
- List games such as “Categories”. Pick a category (e.g. fruits) and go around the circle asking each child to add the name of one fruit. No fruits may be said twice so children must remember which ones were already mentioned
As children explore and interact with their environment and nature, they also learn about early science concepts.
A great example is learning about physics by discovering the properties of water during water play:
- Water makes sand heavier.
- Water influences the texture of sand.
- Water falls through space (e.g. through a sieve).
- Air (wind) moves water.
- Water is a liquid because it pours.
- Water takes the shape of the container it is poured into.
Where better to learn social skills than in preschool? Children are surrounded by friends and adults and they learn to interact appropriately with others.
Throughout the day children learn about:
- Taking turns
- Sharing
- Considering the opinions of others
- Showing empathy
- Cooperating and negotiating
- Resolving conflicts
- Leading and following
- Creating and following rules in games to encourage positive interaction
Preschool is where a child’s creative spark can really be ignited.
There are many opportunities throughout the school day where children develop their creative expression:
- During art activities – painting, constructing, drawing
- Musical activities – dancing, singing and playing with instruments
- Playing with construction toys
- Drama and puppet play
- Telling stories
- Fantasy/ dress-up play
- Outdoor play (e.g. building forts)
Last but perhaps most importantly, the greatest takeaway for young children at preschool is their growing independence.
Children learn to take care of themselves and show a sense of responsibility and a desire to be competent.
There are endless opportunities for this:
- Regular tidy-up times
- Taking accountability for actions
- Looking after belongings (shoes, bags, books, etc.)
- Self-care (going to the bathroom, washing hands, etc.)
- Making choices throughout the day (during free play or activities with choice)
And there you have it. That is certainly not a complete list as your kids are learning so much but that is more or less a summary of what skills a preschooler should have.
Here is a detailed school readiness checklist if you’d like to delve into each developmental area more.
Be wary of preschools that focus on academic skills. This is developmentally inappropriate and, as you can see from the list above, play is important during the early years.
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8 skills that are useful for developing a preschooler and elementary school student
School preparation / Early childhood development
The LogicLike team talks about the skills that are important to master in preschool and primary school age in the first place.
LogicLike is an online platform for the development of children aged 5-12. We teach children to reason and work with information, develop logic and non-standard thinking.
1. Ability and desire to learn: cognitive abilities and interest in learning
Perception, attention, memory, imagination, speech, thinking are mental cognitive processes that make up the ability and desire to learn. For most children, the development of cognitive interest is a natural process laid down by nature. At preschool age, inquisitive children most of all want to discover something new.
Closer to 5-7 years, the child no longer simply perceives information in finished form, as it was before. An inquisitive mind seeks to find answers to questions on its own. An inquisitive preschooler learns to bring different concepts into one system, analyzes them, compares them, looks for patterns and draws conclusions.
Hot interest and curiosity are the basis of independent motivation of a preschooler and a first grader to study.
The elementary school curriculum does not contain separate classes devoted to the development of cognitive abilities. Therefore, the task of teaching the child to learn largely falls on the parents.
High cognitive interest plus developed attention, memory, thinking and other cognitive abilities will help you get used to school without stress, become more independent, proactive and avoid chronic academic failure.
See also: The benefits of entertaining mathematics and solving logic problems.
The ability to learn independently cannot be overestimated. Technology is developing many times faster than it was 20 years ago, and specialists of any profession are in the race for new knowledge. Try to imagine what will happen in another 20 years.
2. Creative thinking: the ability to think outside the box, contrary to patterns
The ability to create something new, unconventional - this is how classical psychology defines the concept of "creative thinking". You should not associate it exclusively with art: extraordinary solutions are welcome in any field of activity, be it acting or mobile application development.
At the age of 5-7 years, thinking is not constrained by stereotypes and it is easier for a child to learn to be “creative”. This will help in the future to get out of any difficult situations, simply connecting creative thinking.
See also: 10 ideas and exercises to develop creativity.
The ability to think outside the box is useful not only in everyday life. For example, engineer and ornithologist Eiji Nakatsu developed a rounded nose for a bullet train. The idea came from observing the kingfisher, a bird whose streamlined beak allows it to fish easily, plunging into the water without splashing. This train design reduced air resistance and energy costs.
3. The ability to think logically: we develop logical and mathematical intelligence
Some everyday and educational problems can be solved creatively. But in most cases, when an objective, balanced approach is needed, creativity is not enough. Logical thinking comes to the rescue:
- ability to think;
- to prove the truth or falsity of judgments;
- make informed decisions;
- explain your position to yourself and others.
When a child pumps logical thinking and mathematical abilities, he learns to use specific concepts, "weigh" options and make decisions.
Solving entertaining logic problems is a proven way to develop logic in preschoolers and younger students. Is your child 5-7 years old? This is the perfect time to start.
Day after day, more than 100,000 students
complete 10-20 assignments on the LogicLike website. And how much can you? Choose where to start:
Riddles and questions Riddles and questions
Logic tasks Logic tasks
Children with developed logical and mathematical intelligence can easily cope with school mathematics. In grades 3-4, they win mathematical olympiads and, in general, have more chances for a breakthrough in overall intellectual development.
4. Spatial thinking and imagination: developing visual-spatial intelligence
It is possible to create 3D pictures in your head, look at them in great detail and rotate them as you like with the help of spatial thinking and imagination. By developing these abilities, the child learns to navigate in space, recognize directions of movement, determine the sides of the horizon, understand the position of objects in space and perceive their shape.
This is interesting: Games and tasks for the development of spatial thinking of preschoolers.
Universal skills for success in any endeavors
The ability and desire to learn, creative, logical-mathematical and spatial thinking are components of the intellect and are absolutely necessary for both children and adults. However, this is not enough to achieve success.
Special, "hard" skills (hard skills) affect a person's success in a particular activity. They, too, can and should be developed from childhood, especially if the child has obvious inclinations and interests.
What can determine the success of a person in a variety of activities? General, soft skills It is equally useful in study, work and personal affairs. “Soft” skills are the basis for the development of special skills and human efficiency in everything.
We have identified 4 universal skills, qualities (their groups) that will definitely be useful to your child at school and later in life.
5. Communication skills: the ability to communicate and speak in public
The ability to conduct a dialogue, negotiate, convince somewhere, and give in somewhere, helps to join the team and find a common language with any person. A sociable person is more likely to reveal his abilities and succeed than someone who is stuck in communication.
6. Ability to work with information
When the information in the head is not sorted out, but falls into a heap, it is much more difficult to find and use something valuable.
For effective work and study, it is important to be able to:
- evaluate information for accuracy and reliability;
- to filter out the superfluous and empty, to highlight the main thing;
- combine elements into semantic groups;
- memorize and find the right information in time.
"Who owns the information, he owns the world. "
Nathan Rothschild
7. Self-organization, time management
Sometimes it seems that a person's life is organized by circumstances. School drives into the framework of lessons for 45 minutes, work creates the boundaries of an 8-10-hour working day.
But without the ability to plan things and manage your time, it is difficult to be productive. This is something that is not taught in school, but without which it is difficult to do without in life.
“I’ve been thinking about how to kill time more than once!” said Alice from Lewis Carroll's fairy tale to the Hatter. He answered her:
“How can he (time) like this? If you didn’t quarrel with him, you could ask him for anything you want.
8. Personal qualities: leadership, will, perseverance
Purposeful, stress-resistant, responsible, proactive, hardworking, able to cope with routine tasks - like a torn line from a resume of a top specialist, isn't it? All these qualities are classified as soft skills. They are not related to a specific profession, but without them any work is difficult.
Personal qualities are formed in childhood and depend on upbringing. It is important in this regard to correctly “distribute responsibilities” between the school and parents.
Abilities and skills open up a world of possibilities for the child
It all starts with the discovery of the inclinations laid down by nature, which are easiest to develop into abilities. But without effort, even rich inclinations run the risk of remaining in the stage of unsprouted grains.
A vivid example is in the biography of the Russian painter Vasily Surikov. His inclinations for drawing appeared early, but by the time he entered the art academy, they were not developed to a sufficient degree, according to teachers.
“Is this your work? Yes, for such drawings, you should even be forbidden to walk past the Academy!
, the examiner remarked sternly.
Surikov did not agree, in three months he completed a three-year course with the artist Dyakonov and successfully entered. To make this example even more revealing, imagine that Surikov never discovered his ability to draw.
How do you like it if your child agrees with the school teacher, they say, “well, there are no abilities for mathematics and logic - a humanist”?
At any age, it's not too early and not too late!
In childhood, the potential for the distant future is laid. But does this mean that it is already too late for adults to develop their abilities? Not at all.
This is confirmed by people who debunk myths by their example. Belarusian biathlete Daria Domracheva received two higher economic educations before realizing in sports.
Self-taught artist Henri Rousseau began painting at a mature age, with only military service and customs experience behind him. It is never too late to develop and discover a second wind.
What else is worth remembering?
- Listen to your child and help him develop in what he likes. Do not try to realize only your ambitions, do not strive to grow a new Hans Zimmer or Steve Jobs.
- Lay down the basic abilities that will definitely come in handy for any teenager and adult. For this, he will definitely thank you.
- Continue the development of thinking, cognitive interest and other skills with LogicLike. Our activities are fun for kids and adults!
On the LogicLike platform, we teach and develop children in a playful way, from simple to complex. Study online at any convenient time.
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What and how to teach a preschooler
How many times each of us was amazed at how quickly time flies! It seems that just recently your baby took the first steps and uttered the first words, and now the time is very close when your child, having crossed the threshold of the school, will become a first grader. A period of responsible and difficult work will come for him and for you: to learn new things every day, learn to think and reason, build your relationships with peers. And, of course, every parent cannot help but worry about the following questions: how will the child's school life turn out? How will he study? Is he ready for school? What can and what should a family do to make school years a joyful and happy period of growing up, learning, and work for a child?
So, in order for your child to learn school material well, he needs to be taught a lot of things, especially at preschool age. Parents need to understand that it is necessary to teach a child in such a way as to stimulate not only mental, but also mental development. A lot has been written about what and how to teach a preschooler, and yet we often come across a depressing fact: parents have little idea of what exactly they should do.
They do not have a clear program of action, which means that there is no necessary sequence. Parents are lost in the flow of various information, they begin to rush about: what to teach? What book to read? What is the best game to buy? Which kindergarten should I send my child to? And so on ad infinitum: questions, questions, questions. And poor children from the age of four or five, forcedly, under pressure from their parents, write a stick, learn a number series, memorize long poems they do not understand, and much, much more. But what does this give for their mental development, for the development of basic cognitive processes: perception, thinking, independent speech?
Very often educators and psychologists come across a sad phenomenon when a six-year-old child, who is too capable, according to his parents, can count up to a hundred perfectly, but cannot count ten matches lying in front of him. Why is that? - you ask. We answer: a child of preschool age is not yet able to realize that counting is not a way to get parents' praise, but a means of determining quantity. A no less sad sight is the child's knowledge of letters, which is not connected with the sound-letter analysis of the word, and even more so with the ability to compose syllables and words from individual letters. Such knowledge can become a serious brake on the way not only to acquiring literacy, but also to the successful development of the school curriculum as a whole.
So what should be taught to a preschooler in order for him to develop correctly, harmoniously and be ready for school? The child must be taught everything, not only directly those skills that are necessary in school education: reading, writing, counting, but also all those skills and abilities that are necessary in everyday life: to correctly use the objects surrounding him, namely action, and not dry knowledge about an object or phenomenon.
Family education
How does the education and preparation of the child for school begin? Of course, from family upbringing. Remember the proverb: “If you sow an act, you will reap a habit; if you sow a habit, you will reap a character; if you sow a character, you will reap a destiny”? In everyday communication with children, the seeds of the future character are laid, which then will give good or evil shoots. Neglecting this is often very costly! Very often school failures of our children, their difficult entry into the team, inability or, even worse, unwillingness to learn are the result of parental miscalculations and mistakes, those relationships that reign in the family, those life orientations that are assimilated in it.
All parents, without exception, make sure that their child does not need anything, is fed, shod and clothed.
Many spare no time and effort to teach their three-year-old son or daughter to write, read and count, mistakenly believing that this is preparation for school. However, this is not enough for a full-fledged upbringing. Just as zealously, we must take care of what we fill the mind, heart and soul of the child, because his psychological development largely depends on this, and therefore, his formation as a person.
To develop cognitive abilities
To develop a child's cognitive abilities does not mean giving him "ready-made" knowledge, skills and abilities; First of all, we are talking about developing a child's need for this knowledge, determining possible ways to obtain it, and teaching them to think and reason. The success of his education depends on how well the student has developed cognitive activity and independence.
Is it possible to set such a complex task in relation to a preschooler? Yes, you certainly may! It is during the period of preschool age that a kind of database is laid, which will be necessary for the child throughout the entire education.
The child acquires cognitive experience primarily in a variety of activities. Each of its types makes its own, special contribution to the development of the child. How does it happen? The first independent activity of a preschooler is subject. She introduces him to the world of things created by human hands, and helps to understand why we need them. Mastering objective actions is the first step in mastering material culture. However, parents should remember that this will only happen if the object is used for its functional purpose, only under this condition the child will fully comprehend the properties of objects, their relationships, while simultaneously developing perception, representation, and, consequently, mental operations.
Mastering object actions first occurs in the game. Gradually, the child learns to replace the missing objects with others, but similar (a thermometer with a stick, soap with a cube), then with any others, endowing them with the appropriate function, and, finally, with words. This is how imagination develops, the ability to abstract from a specific situation and model a new, imagined reality. Later, the cognitive activity of the child is built on this solid foundation.
Teach your child to play - at first simply operate with objects, imitating real actions, their logic and sequence. The next stage - the child already knows how to act independently, play out entire plots, the main purpose of which is to reflect the child's vision of relations between other people: family, business, etc. Only at this stage of the child's play development, actions can already become purely symbolic, and real objects - be replaced by others, with which you can depict the desired action. Having passed all this playful way, your child will gain a lot, having significantly advanced in his development, he will receive the necessary knowledge about the objects around him, phenomena, human relations, which will contribute to the development of thinking and imagination.
The first types of productive activity of the child - visual and constructive . Creating something new with his own hands - be it a drawing, a plasticine craft, a building made of cubes - he seeks to reflect the world around him as truthfully as possible, and this, in turn, contributes to the further development of perception, spatial representations. In the development of the child's cognitive abilities, an important role is played by labor , which incorporates all types of activity.
Labor education begins in the family
You can join it in completely different ways - this is self-service, household chores, working in nature, making various handicrafts, mastering craft skills. Raising a child's readiness for work is one of the main tasks in preparing children for school, because the success of education largely depends on how much the child is accustomed to work, whether he has the necessary personal qualities that allow him to productively cope with educational tasks.
At home and on the street, people around the child are busy with various kinds of work; the things with which the child comes into contact are the result of labor; the importance of labor in people's lives should be fully realized by the child. Respect for any work and for a person engaged in business must be brought up purposefully and consistently from an early age, protecting children from laziness and selfishness. K.D. Ushinsky said: “Education should not only develop a person’s mind and give him a certain amount of information, but should kindle in him a thirst for serious work, without which his life cannot be either worthy or happy.”
The child's work should supplement the experience of being able to organize activities, should teach to help others, to take care of loved ones. Help your child experience the joy of a job well done: “Look how bright and clean it is”, “See how the washed dishes shine”, “It's good that you helped grandma: now she can relax and play with you.” Before going to bed, talk with your child about how the day went, what he managed to do, what he learned new, ask him to talk about vivid impressions and events. So gradually the standard of any activity and an independent assessment of its results will be formed in the preschooler.
Cognitive activity
All types of cognitive activity of a child allow mobilizing his cognitive abilities, and therefore, developing them, teaching not only to navigate in the world around him, but also to change it to some extent. However, for this to happen, parents need to properly organize any activity of the child: they need to determine its goal together with him, think over possible ways to achieve this goal, plan a sequence of actions, control himself during work, be able to correctly and objectively evaluate the result. The acquisition of such skills in planning one's own activities is necessary for a child in the process of schooling.
For the proper development and upbringing of a child, it is very important for parents to create emotional comfort, they need constant attention to their behavior and to the behavior of their baby, patience, flexibility, sensitivity and tact, the desire and ability to understand the motives of the child's behavior in a particular case. Incontinence, shouting, abuse of adults give rise not only to a feeling of resentment, distrust, injustice, but also a state of anxiety, self-doubt, which can have a detrimental effect on the child's further education outside the home, in general educational institutions.
We are glad that the child loves to draw, sculpt, design, play with blocks, dolls and cars - the kid is busy, and this is enough for parents. But how often do you ask yourself questions: what do these classes give him? How does he play, construct, sculpt, draw, work? What difficulties does it experience? Does he finish what he started? Meanwhile, observation of the child's play activity can play a decisive role in the cognitive development of the child and his preparation for school. Without interfering with the child, without suppressing his initiative, observe him in order to tactfully help him realize and enrich his activities, organize classes, direct them in the right direction of mental development.
Here is a baby playing with a doll: dressing, undressing, feeding. Draw his attention to the meaning of these actions: undresses to put to bed or bathe; dresses to go to visit or for a walk; feeds, educates, etc. Show your imagination and wake up the baby's fantasy - this will help you and him to develop your own model of family behavior.
Before drawing, ask him what he wants to draw and what is needed for this - paints, pencils, felt-tip pens; why he wants to choose this particular color and not some other. Discuss the completed drawing: what worked and what didn’t work, and it’s important that the child pays attention to what worked and what didn’t.
Emotions and will of a preschooler
The development of the emotional-volitional sphere determines the formation of a child's personality. It is at preschool age that the assimilation of moral norms takes place, the ability to subordinate one's actions and actions to moral and ethical rules is developed, and the skills of behavior in a team are formed. It should be noted that the emotional-volitional sphere does not develop by itself, but requires long-term painstaking work, otherwise it may form incorrectly, as a result, the child's behavior may take undesirable forms, he may become selfish, spoiled, and intellectual abilities will remain unclaimed.
If a child is brought up correctly, then by the age of six he not only learns basic moral concepts, but also learns to act in accordance with them.
The child's idea of himself, of his "I" changes significantly: he begins to have a clearer idea of his capabilities, to understand how others relate to him and how this attitude is explained. On the basis of correct self-assessment, an adequate reaction to censure and approval is developed - the child, in response to the remark of adults, no longer cries, does not quit the lesson, but tries to correct the mistake, find new ways to complete what has been started.
A preschool child often encounters various difficulties - intellectual, everyday, behavioral. But, whatever the nature of the activity that caused certain difficulties, they can be divided into two groups:
- firstly, these are problems that a child simply cannot cope with on his own, due to his age;
- secondly, these are problems that your child can overcome on their own, using their past experience or acting through their own trial and error.
The main task of parents in the first case is to tactfully, without insisting, help the child cope with the difficulty that has arisen, explain, direct; and in the second - just as sensitively and flexibly to push the child to solve the problem, to force him to use the experience accumulated earlier.
However, adults need to remember that the assessment of all the actions of the child must be as objective and accurate as possible, because a child aged 5-6 sees himself through the eyes of other people, and their attitude serves as the basis for him, the standard of self-esteem. During this period, your baby needs empathy and understanding from adults - parents and caregivers, at the same time, for his part, he begins to evaluate the actions of other people, their character and behavior, so it is very important for parents to strengthen their authority in the eyes of the baby during this period.
By the age of 6-7, a child has such feelings as shame if one or another of his actions does not correspond to the moral standards accepted in the family, and pride if the action corresponds to them, and especially if it is associated with overcoming certain difficulties and obstacles . Therefore, parents need to very carefully punish or encourage the child, his desire for good deeds will depend on this in the future.
It is at this age that a child develops a conscious need to communicate with other children. He learns to correlate his actions with the actions of his comrades, to take into account not only his own, but also their desires and interests, evaluate the actions of his peers and focus on their assessment. At this age, real friendships are born - it is important for parents to teach the child to be friends, in some cases to give in, and in some cases to defend their opinion. These skills are required to facilitate the passage of such an important test in the life of first graders as life in a completely new school community.
The ability to communicate
The ability to communicate and find a common language not only with adults, but also with their peers is another necessary condition for the development and preparation of children for school.
It must be said that the desire for communication in a preschooler is based on the need to know another person, strangers and compare oneself with them. By the way your child is among strangers, one can judge not only his character, habits, but also the miscalculations of his parents in his upbringing. After all, parents and other relatives are the first people who not only satisfy his need for communication, but also give him a standard of behavior. Therefore, adults are obliged to take care of the proper emotional and aesthetic level of communication of the child, to teach him to empathize and be kind to the interlocutor.
Another important condition for a child's readiness, which parents should pay special attention to, is nurturing a child's desire to learn. To do this, first of all, the parents themselves must clearly understand why their child goes to school - not for fives and a good certificate, but for knowledge, skills and abilities.
School years are a part of a child's life, and therefore it is important that it be filled not only with the happiness of learning, familiarization with the treasures of world culture, but also with the joy of communication, hard work and, at the same time, creativity. This is what you need to teach your child first of all.
At school, a child should not only acquire the necessary knowledge and skills, but also learn how to independently acquire new ones, see and creatively solve problems that arise. It is also necessary to accustom a preschooler to this at an accessible level for him. The desire and ability to learn, the joy of gaining new knowledge is the basis of a responsible attitude to learning. As the author of the excellent “Pedagogical Poem” A.S. Makarenko rightly noted: “What a person will be, mainly depends on how you make him by the fifth year of life. If you haven’t raised him properly before the age of five, then you will have to re-educate him.”
Taking into account the many factors in the education of a preschooler, one can once again be convinced that the psychological preparation of children for school is absolutely necessary, and it is necessary to “lead” the mental development of a child from early childhood.
The first and most important condition for a child's mental preparation for school is cooperation with the adults around him: mom, dad, grandma, grandpa. Moreover, cooperation should be understood as such organized joint activity of a child and an adult, during which the latter transfers his social experience in its various forms, and the former adopts it and makes it his own. Therefore, an adult should be able to look at himself and his life through the eyes of a child, constantly caring not only about what and how he passes on to the child, but also that the child wants to learn what is being transmitted.
For many children, the difficulties of entering the school community are due to the fact that they did not learn how to build interpersonal relationships in time, they do not know how to subordinate their desires and actions to the requirements of adults and the interests of their comrades. Not accustomed to consider other people's opinions, children become selfish, stubborn, capricious, unfriendly towards their classmates and sometimes even towards the teacher. If a child is unhappy, impulsive, anxious, then the reason lies, as a rule, in the emotional atmosphere of the family, in a disrespectful and intolerant attitude towards each other.